Tips for altering the currently active tab in a separate window using a browser extension?

I'm currently working on developing a Firefox Extension and I'm facing a challenge. I'm trying to navigate to a specific browser tab in a different window. After reading through the Firefox Browser Extensions API documentation, I learned that I can adjust the focused window and the active tab within that window separately. I tried using the code below in my background script to accomplish this task. However, the browser behavior I encountered was less than ideal - it first shifted focus to the window with the previously active tab before moving to the desired tab, creating a glitchy effect.

browser.windows.update(windowId, {focused:true})
browser.tabs.update(tabId,{active:true})

Does anyone have suggestions on how I can seamlessly navigate to a different tab in another window in one smooth operation?

Any help is greatly appreciated!

Answer №1

Unfortunately, there is no direct way to accomplish this task with a single operation. In order to achieve this, you will need to first activate the tab and then focus on the window after tab activation. Here is an example code snippet to demonstrate this:

async function focusOnTab(tabId) {
  const tab = await browser.tabs.get(tabId);
  if (!tab.active)
    await new Promise(resolve => {
      const listener = activeInfo => {
        if (activeInfo.tabId != tabId)
          return;
        browser.tabs.onActivated.removeListener(listener);
        resolve();
      };
      browser.tabs.onActivated.addListener(listener)
      browser.tabs.update(tabId, { active: true });
    });
  browser.windows.update(tab.windowId, { focused: true });
}

focusOnTab(1);

Answer №2

After seeking inspiration from Piro, I attempted to activate the tab first and then change the focus of the window using the two code snippets below. Unfortunately, in both cases, the tab activation could not keep up with the window focus change, resulting in a glitchy experience.

browser.tabs.update(tabId,{active:true})
browser.windows.update(windowId, {focused:true})

browser.tabs.update(tabId,{active:true}).then(() =>
 browser.windows.update(windowId, {focused:true})
)

Ultimately, I decided to implement a solution that involves a brief delay before changing the window focus. By optimizing the sleep duration to 50 ms, I was able to achieve a smoother transition.

browser.tabs.update(audibleTabs[0].id,{active:true})
setTimeout(() => 
    browser.windows.update(window.id, {focused:true})
, 50);

Chrome Adjustment: When testing my extension on Chrome, I discovered that a 50ms delay was insufficient. Therefore, I adjusted the sleep time to 150ms specifically for Chrome.

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